Q:
Unsure of mechanic's advice

asked by
Megan R
on
September 06, 2016

I had a full service on my Renault Clio 2007 Dynamique last week. There were a couple of advisories: Slight play in steering rack & slight play in one of the ball joints. Also a rusty hole in the sub frame and brake fluid needs changing. Now the last 2 problems the mechanic said to wait about a month then get it fixed. And the first 2 problems (slight play) the mechanic said to wait until november, see if it passes the mot and just wait until it gets really bad. I'm just worried that this is a long time and would rather get it all fixed ASAP.. is this reasonable? Is it dangerous to wait like the garage said?

Nothing you have described is an emergency. However, your general supposition is correct in that the repairs should be made at an early opportunity. Cars are complex mechanical devices. What happens in practice is if you don’t keep up on maintenance and let this or that go, you end up at some point with cascading problems, sometimes interlinked, and thus hard to diagnose.

It is cheaper and more efficient to repair faults as they arise. That way when a new problem crops up, diagnosis is easier and the problem is not interwoven with other things that have already failed but you never bothered replacing.

So, the bottom line is, if a competent mechanic told you something is broken, fix it. The issue of developing and assigning a probability of catastrophic failure then becomes a moot issue and a needless investigation.

If you’d like a second opinion on the diagnostics you were given, consider YourMechanic, as a certified technician can come to your home or office to service your vehicle. Best of luck.

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